Highlights and Lowlights

What's in the Bag
The Korean players have certainly distinguished themselves by their great play this year, and many of them are also known for their fashionable attire. But another way they get attention is in their choice of head covers for their golf clubs. At the recent US Women's Open, the USGA ran a feature about the head covers the players use, and the Korean gals were prominently mentioned.

Mi Hyun Kim these days has Popeye in her bag. She explains that he's in there because, like her, he is very strong, then breaks down in laughter. She also has Goofy, even though he "looked stupid", because she enjoys the big silly grin on his face.

Kimmie isn't the only top player who likes the Popeye universe. Jeong Jang has Olive Oyl and Brutus covering her clubs, and Se Ri has been known to have Brutus as well from time to time. Jang's most popular head covers are a series of funny monkeys, which she says she picked because she was born in the year of the monkey. This website shows you where she got these covers from.

Soo Yun Kang and Seol-An Jeon are also mentioned in the article. Seol-An favors Snoopy, because that's her nickname! Soo Yun, meanwhile, has many cartoon head covers, including Tigger, Hello Kitty (which Mi Hyun also likes), Odie (from the Garfield comic strip), and Elmo from Sesame Street.

Read the complete article here!

Players Who Did Well
We talked a bit about Jeong Jang already, but another player has shown time and again that she gets this Major thing: Young Kim. Last year, Young Kim only played two of the four Majors, but made top tens in both of them. This year, she had a 30th at the LPGA Championship and a 16th at the Nabisco. And again at the Orchards, site of the US Women's Open, she distinguished herself. Her first two rounds were quite solid, leaving her just two over par going into the weekend. She struggled quite a bit on Saturday, shooting a 76 that plummeted her down the leaderboard, but recovered with a brilliant 68 on Sunday to move to 4 over, good for a tie for 20th. So in her first five Majors as a pro, she has two top tens, four top twenties and no worse finish than 30th. Well done!

Mention should also go to Shi Hyun Ahn, who survived her first US Women's Open quite nicely. Though she did not have any great rounds like Young Kim, she did shoot four consistent rounds that left her at 6 over for the week, good for a tie for 29th.

Players Who Struggled
We already talked about Se Ri Pak, who ended up finishing 32nd. While this is an improvement from her 50th place finish at last year's Open at Pumpkin Ridge, it's still well below what you would expect from a player of Se Ri's caliber. Grace Park had a notably bad event. In her previous five Majors, she had finished 2nd, 10th, 3rd, 1st and 3rd. But this week, she shot two of her worst rounds of the year on the weekend to plunge into 64th place, second worst of those who made the cut. This performance is so far outside the mean for Grace that one has to assume her back came into play. We all hope she can speedily recover from whatever is ailing her and return to her great form again!

Two other notable players also struggled at the Open. Jung Yeon Lee has been a big question mark the last few weeks. After starting her season with a bang that included a 60 at the first event of the year, two early 2nd place finishes, and her first career top ten in a Major, Jung Yeon seemed to have disappeared. Indeed, after missing the cut at the Sybase Classic, she rebounded with a tie for 31st at Corning, then dropped out of the LPGA Championship. She did not play between that Major and this one, and though she made it through two rounds here, she missed the cut by a big margin. Her lack of play in the last month strongly suggests she has been injured. If so, here's hoping for a speedy recovery.

The other surprising result came from In-Bee Park. The 15 year old amateur wunderkind played her first US Women's Open this year, and after winning her sectional qualifier the previous week, looked primed for a great run. Alas, it didn't happen. She never recovered from a disastrous first round that saw her making 5 bogeys and a double bogey despite hitting 13 of 14 fairways. She shot a 77, and though her second round was a far more solid 72, it was still not enough to allow her to make the cut. The experience will be good for her, though, and look for her to do much better in 2005's Open.

JJ at Rochester with her bag of friends
Bob McIntosh for SeoulSisters.com
(click to enlarge)

Se Ri poses with her collection of head covers,
which includes Tigger, Pink Panther, and
Grumpy from Snow White

Young Kim had yet another strong Major last week

High times: Jung Yeon Lee during her great run at
the year's first Major